


Broken Together

by emmiegrace



Series: Post-Apocalyptic Stress Disorder [1]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Depression, Flashbacks, Fluff and Angst, Future Fic, Gen, Guilt, Hurt/Comfort, I just love Pacifica and I will include her in everything fight me, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-14
Updated: 2017-06-14
Packaged: 2018-11-13 23:16:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11195505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/emmiegrace/pseuds/emmiegrace
Summary: Going through the apocalypse isn't something that you can leave unscarred.A future-fic set the in the Summer of 2019. The twins have just left college. Everyone still has emotional baggage, but they know how to deal with it. Together.





	Broken Together

After graduating high school, Dipper goes to West Coast Tech and Mabel goes to the prestigious art school only twenty minutes away from it. They share an apartment in the middle. But even with each other they still can’t shake the feeling that they aren’t _home._

Mabel ends up despising her college. The haughty professors keep telling her her work is _too happy_ that it isn’t _deep enough_ . That she needs to tap into her emotional life experiences and put them on the canvas. But she just _can’t-_ no, she _refuses._ Mabel Pines _talks_ about the shit she’s been through when she needs to, with the people who went through it with her. She refuses to share that kind of horror with anyone who has been lucky enough to escape it. She refuses to poison her art -herself- with the sort of evil she’d experienced at only twelve years old.

Dipper, likewise, experiences disillusionment with WCT. He went expecting to learn from the greatest minds of the century, to absorb knowledge left and right and discover new and amazing things. But he ended up just feeling incomplete and unfulfilled. He’s a lot like his Great Uncle Ford, that’s something he’s always been proud to say, but unlike his Grunkle he isn’t content to simply sit in a class and discuss theories, or to only _observe_ the phenomena. He needs to experience, to adventure, to discover. And these professors... most of them have barely stepped out of the library in decades, and none of them have been to Gravity Falls. How could they call themselves investigators of the supernatural when they haven’t even set foot in the most paranormal town in North America?

Needless to say, the Pines Twins drop out of college after their first year. They return home.

Grunkle Stan and Great Uncle Ford retire from their life of seafaring adventure shortly after the kids drop out. They got a letter somewhere off the coast of Iceland (Ford had trained carrier pigeons years ago) from the twins explaining their decision, along with the news that they they are returning to Gravity Falls. Stan and Ford decided they wanted to spend whatever time they had left with their favorite kids in the world (and their extended family of course), so they set a course back to Oregon. There was still plenty of adventure to be found in Gravity Falls.

Melody and Soos (and Abuelita) had moved out of the Mystery Shack soon after they had gotten married in 2013 so that they could start a family in a bigger (less freaky, constantly visited, and riddled with reminders from the apocalypse) home. The two sets of Pines twins were more than happy to move back into the rooms that had never really stopped being their own. (Dipper’s and Mabel’s room actually never having been lived in by anyone but themselves- seeing as they moved back into it every Summer anyhow).

 

The whole town gathers at the Mystery Shack to welcome back the Pines family that Summer (for good this time). Despite the party being partly for her, Mabel has a heavy hand in the planning, which ends up being incredibly obvious. From the glitter covered floor to the rainbow streamers, to the purple karaoke set on stage- the place positively screams Mabel. Even at 19 years old Mabel is still the bright happy bubbly personality she was at 12- something everyone is indescribably thankful for.

Dipper especially. A lot of brothers will talk about how annoying their sisters are, and yeah Mabel can get under his skin every once and awhile, but more than anything she’s the one that’s been keeping him sane since everything happened. Her skin is way thicker than his, and when the two freaks came back from Nowhere, Oregon talking about the apocalypse- they ended up getting a lot of flack for that. Mabel was the only one able to keep Dipper’s fists from constantly flying at the jerks calling him and his sister names. Eventually they realized they weren’t going to be able to make friends outside of each other in Piedmont. They couldn’t connect with these people who haven’t seen what they have. They made themselves outsiders in their own town in able to keep themselves sane and protect the innocent. But they never felt lonely- they always had each other (and their friends in Gravity Falls). How close they were along with how often they separated themselves from everyone else made them ‘the weird twins’, but they were completely okay with that.

But they didn’t have to be like that in Gravity Falls. Finally,   _finally_ , they could stay where they belonged.

“CANDY! GRENDA!” Mabel practically screams across the room when her two oldest friends enter the party. She runs to meet them halfway, Waddles squealing excitedly behind her. Dipper plugs his ears as the girly squealing and jumping ensues.

Candy had gone to train for a top secret agency she couldn’t name in D.C. after graduating high school two years early. She’d cut her hair short and now wore thick rimmed square lenses. She was also wearing black skinny jeans and long sleeve top- the epitome of a government agent. It contrasted strangely with her girlish screams and erratic jumping.

Grenda had also left Gravity Falls after graduation, pursuing a successful career in wrestling. She was as buff as ever this Summer, and was clearly freshly tanned from whatever holiday her and the Baron Marius von Fundshauser had just been on.

Wendy surprises Dipper by clapping him on the shoulder while he's distracted watching his sister and her friends catch up. “Oh, Jesus!” He exclaims, jumping a bit and turning to face the redhead he’d long since met in height. (Well close to anyway, Wendy had Manly Dan’s genes are her side keeping her still two inches above Dipper).

“Actually, Soos is over there.” Wendy jokes, pointing to somewhere Dipper doesn’t bother to follow. Wendy had become a nature photographer- “but only for the badass stuff.” Magazines and TV Stations would call her with a plane ticket to one place or another, and pay her good money to get legitimate shots of some of the most dangerous creatures on earth. But none of it ever compared to the shit she saw in the apocalypse, so she considered it easy work. Besides, it was the best way for her to stay in Gravity Falls with the people she loved, and still get to adventure the world outside of it. (Not that the town wasn’t exciting enough on its own- it just doesn’t pay well).

Dipper would ask her how she’s been, but he’d just spoken to her yesterday when she was on her way back from Peru. “Wendy!” He exclaims instead, opening his arms for a hug she gladly accepts.

“The Mystery Twins are back!” She proclaims after they break apart, enthusiastically pumping her fist into the air. “It’s about damn time!”

Before Dipper can respond though, Mabel is back at his side. “You bet!” She yells, and then proceeds to thump Dipper’s baseball cap over his eyes.

“Oh that  reminds me!” Dipper says to Wendy while adjusting his cap, “You’re hat’s upstairs I’ll go-”

He takes one step towards the exit but Wendy interrupts him, “Don’t bother! You’ll get it to me tomorrow.” She says, knowing it’s true. At the end of every Summer since the first they’ve been swapping hats only to hand them back at the beginning of the next. It sort of became a promise between the two best friends. The moose hat had had a place of honor on Dipper’s book shelves in Piedmont, since middle California didn’t often get cold enough to warrant wearing it. Mabel may be able to wear sweaters in 90 degree heat- but Dipper was hot-natured.

Wendy pulls the pine tree hat out of her camera bag though and replaces Dipper’s San Francisco Giant’s Baseball cap. “Much better.” She smirks.

Mabel is suddenly overcome with the urge to squeal and hug her brother. “WE’RE HOME!” She yells, and Waddles oinks excitedly next to her.

Pacifica then comes running up to the twins, “You guys!” she yells, and throws her arms over the both of them. “I missed you two so much!”

Dipper laughs, “You saw us last week Pax!” He says, using one of the many nicknames he’s given her over the years. He’d decided at some point that ‘Pacifica’ was too much of a mouthful.

Pacifica laughs as she pulls back. She had flown up to Seattle to see the twins when they were deciding whether or not to leave college. She’d spent two weeks sleeping on their couch (because Mabel talked in her sleep) surrounded by pros and cons lists, old pizza boxes, and half-full chinese oyster pails. She also helped them pack up their apartment once they’d finally made a decision. “That reminds me, you dorks,” she says, thumping the twins in turn. “I still have boxes cluttering up my house!”

Mabel rolls her eyes, “You have more than enough room for them.” Which was true. As soon as Pacifica had turned 18 she took her (very large) trust fund and left her parents mansion without a word. She couldn’t bare to leave Gravity Falls though, so she bought a small-ish three bedroom house in town (neighbors to Sheriff Blubs and Deputy Durland, and Soos’s family) and started taking business classes at the closest community college- much to her parent’s horror.

Candy and Grenda return then before Pacifica can agree, both carrying platefuls of cheese puffs and cookies. Pacifica hugs them both in turn too. In hindsight, it’s weird the kind of unlikely lifelong-friendships apocalyptic crises can form. “These two traitors,” she jokes, “Just up and left us!”

“What can we say,” Candy blushes.

“We grew out of Gravity Falls!” Grenda finishes for her, laughing.

“Unheard of!” Dipper gasps.

“Unspeakable!” Mabel adds.

“Positively scandalous!” Pacifica joins, putting on the best impression of her mother.

“Absolutely. Insane.” Wendy nods solemnly with wide eyes, causing the rest of the group to dissolve into laughter.

 

That night the twins happily slipped back into the old familiar lumpy mattresses in the attic and slept in the same room for the first time in months. It just always felt like the most natural thing to them. In Fall of 2012 they surprised their parents by moving back into their old-room-turned-guest-room with the old twin beds they had left behind at ten years old. They had tried sleeping separately for only a week after that Summer. They kept waking up in the middle of the night screaming in a cold sweat convinced Bill was back and the other was missing. They crawled into one or the other’s beds by three AM every night anyway- moving back in together just seemed to be the logical decision. By sixteen they were able to separate again, but that didn’t mean they didn’t still have sleepovers (necessary or otherwise).

Their shared room was one of the many reasons though that they couldn’t make friends. It was another thing no one else would ever be able to understand outside of Gravity Falls.

Their parents sent them to therapy at the advisement of the twins’ teachers -suspecting they had codependency issues. Which may have been true for a while, but it wasn’t like they didn’t have good reason. Isaac and Mary soon realized though that nothing was going to split up the two, and they stopped wasting their money on the leather sofa.

Their lack of friendship outside of each other in Piedmont bothered Mabel more than it did Dipper. Dipper just hated the bullying. Mabel couldn’t understand for a long time why she suddenly couldn’t connect with anyone anymore. She was always the girl who could befriend anyone who walked in the door, but suddenly it was like there was huge divide between her and the rest of her peers. It wasn’t that she couldn’t be _friendly_ , or that she couldn’t _talk_ , because she could _always_ do those things. It was that she couldn’t form deep connections or relationships anymore. There were no best friends outside of Gravity Falls. They could never understand her aversion to triangle-cut sandwiches, why gas fire stoves scare her, how easily she can feel claustrophobic, or why she can’t have sleepovers anymore because she may wake up in the middle of the night screaming and crying and _Dipper_ _won’t be there._

It was probably that last thing that freaked people out the most.

 

Dipper wakes up the next morning to find Mabel sitting against the wall on her bed writing in the leather bound journal he’d gotten her for their birthday last year. He’d expected it to be more for her art, but she ended up writing in it just as much. Dipper glances over to his older matching one on the nightstand that he hasn’t written in since last Summer. He could never find anything interesting enough outside of Gravity Falls worth writing about, but he was excited to get back to it this year. “Whatcha writin’?” He yawns, sitting up as he does.

Mabel just sticks her tongue out for increased concentration instead of answering, and honestly Dipper didn’t expect anything different. Neither one of them has ever been any good at multi-tasking. Dipper goes over to place his hand across her face, and Mabel licks it without even thinking. “Ew gross dude!” He chuckles.

Mabel laughs and puts her (pink sparkly) pen down. Waddles takes that as invitation to crawl into her lap. “You ready?” She asks Dipper, raising her eyebrow mysteriously. The effect is lost however, when the messy bun she had tied on the top of her head with only sheer willpower and tangles falls into her face. She flips it back over and absentmindedly pokes Dipper.

When she’d first started doing it Dipper had figured it was just another silly-Mabel-thing, it wasn’t until later that he realized it was her way of making sure he was real. Touching Dipper, in even just an arbitrary way like poking, grounded her whenever she started to feel reality slipping. The first few days after he’d gotten her out of the wish-realm she would suddenly reach out and grab Dipper’s arm and grip it for dear life, but it didn’t take her long to realize how badly _that_ would scare him and send him reeling into thoughts of losing her again. He’d have to grip her back in turn and they ended up having matching bruises above their elbows. That’s when Mabel decided poking would do just as well. Dipper started poking her back too.

He gives a soft smile this time as he returns the gesture. “Ready for what?” He asks, as if nothing had just happened.

 

Downstairs Stan and Ford are adjusting back to life on land with a full sized kitchen when Pacifica and Wendy arrive with doughnuts- saving them from having to remember how to cook something other than cold cereal.

“We were gonna bring coffee,” Pacifica says by way of greeting as they place the boxes on the table, “but we figured Mabel would insist on making hot chocolate.”

“And you’d be right!” Mabel exclaims, running down the stairs with Dipper in tow. “Nice sweater.” She comments with a wink and a grin to Pacifica as she passes.

Pacifica smiles down at the purple knit Mabel had made her years ago. She had a phase shortly after the almost-apocalypse where she wore nothing but sweaters, but for very different reasons than Mabel’s.

Her parents were pretty horrible people. Anyone could see that. They were even worse behind closed doors to Pacifica. Their way of “teaching” her to “live up to the family name” was by brutally punishing her and ringing a bell every time she did anything even remotely childlike. Eventually she would just hear the bell and correct herself- which she supposes was their intention. Unfortunately for her though it worked a little too well. After she’d disobeyed them the first time she’d been locked in her room without food for days. After that she’d started punishing herself for them. If they noticed they didn’t seem to care.

After B- after everything that happened that Summer, she started doing it whenever she got scared and got delusions. She’d hide under her bed and punch her thighs until she was painted purple with bruises, and claw at her arms until she saw blood. It gave her the illusion that she had control over something. That she was in her own hands and not at the mercy of someone else’s.

Mabel and Dipper found her the next Summer crying and throwing fists at herself in the woods on the trail to the shack. She reached out and grabbed for the two of them as soon as she heard their voices, and they obliged, holding her hands away from her as they did. Sobs wracked her body as she rocked back and forth in an effort to calm down. Dipper ran soothing circles over her hands with his thumbs while Mabel brushed her fingers through her hair.

It took her a long time, but after that the twins were able to help her stop. Were able to teach her other ways to ground herself. Mabel had even taught her how to knit with this sweater as her guide. She still wasn’t as good as Mabel, but that wasn’t really the point of it.

Dipper comes over and jokingly pulls at her ponytail. (She’d started wearing it up after the first time they’d found her; Mabel would always take it down to brush it whenever she found her after that). She smiles up at him. She’s crazy thankful for these two dorks.

 

They are only a block away from Pacifica’s house when a car backfires, and Suddenly Wendy can’t _breathe_ . She can’t _think_ . _It is happening again._

It wasn’t like this last time, but last time _she failed._ Last time he took her family away. She looks up and the sky is red. She can see the rip in spacetime in the distance and giant pyramid. Where is her family? He took them! She’s failed again! She’s all they had and she let him take them-

“Wendy, Wendy, hey look at me.” Dipper’s voice breaks through the flashback. His face obstructs the madness surrounding her. He tries to remember what he said the first time this happened.

The first time was the second night after it ended. They decided they needed a good-old-fashioned movie night at the shack. They didn’t know then how bad it really was. There was still adrenaline pumping in their veins. They still thought it was only in sleep that their fears could haunt them. They’d naively picked an alien invasion movie. As soon as the UFO descended from the sky on the screen Dipper could feel his chest tighten, but it was nothing compared to Wendy’s reaction.

Suddenly she was panicking. Breathing heavy and hearing the screams all around her rather than just from the TV’s speakers. She pulled the bat from the floor next to her and started screaming for her brothers. She wasn’t going to make the same mistake this time. She-

“Breathe.” Dipper says now, like he did last time. “In…. Out.” She does this a few times, and Mabel’s and Pacifica’s faces appear next to his.

“You’re having a flashback.” Pacifica says calmly, and Wendy repeats the words to herself on impulse. “Tell us what you see.”

“Bill!” Wendy exclaims, breathing heavy again, “He’s back! He’s-”

“Aah-” Mabel interrupts her, being careful not to touch her despite the impulse. She smiles comfortingly nonetheless, and directs Wendy to breathe with them again. “Who’s in front of you right now?” She asks after a minute. “How many of us are there?”

Wendy counts the three of them outloud twice, and then names them each in turn a few times. She starts to feel the world around them clear.

“What’s that smell?” Dipper asks, almost as if they’re still walking down the street like any other day.

Wendy breathes deeply, focusing on the sense. “Lazy Susan’s pancakes.” She says eventually, smiling at the familiar homey scent. The smell that meant she was safe. The iron, blood, and fire she thought she smelled earlier disappears.

Pacifica presses play on her phone and Wendy’s favorite song starts. Wendy mouths the words absentmindedly. The gunfire and screams fade away.

Mabel silently hands her a Jolly Rancher (green- her favorite flavor), and the flashback melts away with the sweet. She deflates into her friends’ arms and they end up in a little knee-bent group hug. “God that’s embarrassing.” She mumbles after a moment.

“Nah, it isn’t.” Dipper says without a hint of falsity marking his words.

The whole town still can’t watch action movies.

 

Back at the shack Stan and Ford are swimming in the guilt they’ve been running from since they stepped foot on that boat.

They both lost their _best friend-_ their _brother_ for _forty years._ They’ll never get that time back. They screwed up _so much_ because of something _so petty and stupid._ As much as they love being in Gravity Falls again, everything is just a constant reminder of just how much they hate themselves.

They almost lost the kids to their petty fight.

Every night they dream that they weren’t able to save them. That Bill took Dipper and Mabel and then the rest of the world. They both wake up screaming every night, and reaching for something that isn’t there. They have to keep a picture of the twins on their nightstands in order to ground themselves at night. _Bill is gone._ They’ll repeat. _We fixed it. Everything is okay now._

But inside, a voice in the back of their heads whispers that it isn’t. That it never will be.

Stan still has trouble remembering things. It’s not always that he’ll think the world is still ending. Sometimes he’ll forget more important things- like Ford. He’ll just stare at his twin brother with a blank expression trying to remember who this other man on the boat with him is.

The first time it happened Ford nearly had a heart attack. He immediately assumed it was over. That the momentary memories were gone and this was it. His brother was lost to him _again._ He cried and held Stan for half an hour until he finally remembered him again. The relief was quickly washed over though with ice cold fear that this would keep happening- that it would keep getting worse.

(It did).

_(It was all his fault)._

Ford still has panic attacks, usually completely untriggered. He’ll just be sitting there, maybe not even thinking about fear or guilt or stress, and suddenly it will just hit him. His world will come crashing down around him as everything he’s ever feared comes into clear view in his mind. His heart will race and his breathing will shallow and _he’s dying, he’s sure of it._

Stan has gotten pretty good at handling it. He knows not to touch him (learned that lesson the first time), but he’ll say calming things until it’s over. Remind him that everything is actually okay. That he’s safe. They’re both safe. The kids are safe. The world is safe. It’s not on his shoulders anymore. Everything is _okay._

Ford can’t be anywhere with a lot of people anymore. Something about it feeling like he’s simultaneously responsible for everyone there, and that he won’t be able to run when something happens.

_(Stan knows it’s his fault)._

Like Dipper and Mabel they have each other keeping them sane. But unlike them, they have this overwhelming guilt constantly sitting on their chests- and the other is always a reminder of it.

 

 

Yes, they’re all a little broken. They’re all a little bruised. But they were broken and bruised _together._ In the end, that’s what mattered most.

**Author's Note:**

> Did a lot of research for this one. Let me know if something isn't sitting right with you, I love feedback! Especially with heavy works like these. I also really want to do a Pacifica study if anyone would be interested in reading that?
> 
> More to come from this universe m'dears :)
> 
> (Comments keep writer's writing ❤︎)


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